First off, i whole heartedly agree with almost every post the pvp community has made in attempts to reach the devs, and actually enjoyed reading this one.... THe following is how castle in general would read the post...
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--- Before I begin: the TL;DR version is in bold italics. ---
Well, here we go. Im going to post this with the full knowledge that it will probably never land on someones desk, or that no redname other than a moderator will set eyes on it. But Im going to post it anyways. Why? Because I care. I like this game and its players I may not like the decisions of the developers within the last six months or so, but the people I play the game with are important, moreso than the game itself. I sent off this post as an email to NCSoft as well I think its time I made my voice heard.
We have been told several times now that the developers consider post-I13 PvP
.. Oh Great, Another pvp post
blah blah blah blah
The PvP changes in I13 caused the birth of high-end organized PvP. For an overhaul that increased the popularity (and population) of PvP, that should have been a first sign that something was very wrong. Almost every test ladder team formed and hundreds of subscriptions were created in the month or so after open beta began. PvPers were delighted, and rightly so they had spent years without
any official support forming ladders, making rules, setting up matches, and making detailed and comprehensive lists of suggestions to better the system. When I13 was released those PvPers were overjoyed to found almost everything they had asked for, and almost nothing they hadnt. The ladder is just beginning to get back off the ground again but for what? Will you go through a few months from now and make more seemingly awesome and asked-for changes, and then keep telling the players youre listening to their feedback while youre actually doing exactly what they want? For the future of this games PvP and this game in general, I hope so.
Anyways, Id like to begin by taking a look at the
post that sparked this all. At the onset, we have:
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We began by looking at the disparities that existed, and discussed how to address them. Ultimately, we decided that in order to allow better competition between the AT's and powersets, we needed to take some drastic measures. We decided that a different rule set needed to apply in PvP than in PvE. By changing the basic rules, we hope to encourage a greater variety of character builds in Arena PvP, and ultimately in Base Raids and Zone PVP.
At the core, many of the power effects are the same: Heals still heal, attacks still deal damage, and holds still hold. However, the new system makes a number of adjustments that should be friendlier to a wider range of AT's and skill levels. The goal is for players to be able to bring any AT and powerset combination into PVP and to be competitive and have fun! Furthermore, with the Issue 13s Multiple builds feature, players can design a PvP specific build and not have it affect their normal character.
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I think the people that were best-qualified to say what tweaks and changes PvP needed were The Uber-Awesome All Knowing Devs. Yet those lists were largely granted, and some heavy-handed rules were implemented with very little player feedback taken into consideration. DEVS KNOW ALLLL
CASTLE EATS DONUT NOM NOM NOM
Now, on to the meat of Castles post. Lets start with diminishing returns (DR).
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Nearly all attributes characters have are now subject to Diminishing Returns. The specific numbers vary from attribute to attribute, and from class to class (it's easier to Buff Resistance and Defense on a Tanker, than on a Blaster.)
* In general, a single buff will have near full effect, while additional buffs begin to offer less and less benefit. Example: Under the old system, Aim + Build up might provide a combined 67% To Hit buff, while under this system it provides a combined 49% To Hit Buff.
* The calculation is based on the sum of all buffs, so the order the buffs are applied in does not matter.
* It is important to note that the Real Numbers tool will not always report the results of diminishing returns accurately, at least initially. This is specifically true of Damage Buffs, which always display the Pre-Diminished value.
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Oh Mai Castle Ur Su Awesum
LOWER HP DR CURVE
CASTLE NERF GRUNT
Blah Blah Blah
Next, lets talk about travel suppression.
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* PvE Travel Suppression continues to work as it has since it was introduced. PvP Travel Suppression will be handled differently, however (see below.)
* All Teleportation and Summonable Teleportals are Disabled while PvP Travel Suppression is active.
The Duration of Movement Suppression in PvP is now variable based on the most recent suppression event applicable to the character. In case of multiple events applicable on the same server tick, only the longest value is applied.
Suppression events are:
Activating a foe TargetedRange (range > 7') damaging Power: 3s * Sum of damage scales.
Example1: Power Bolt has a damage Scale of 1.0 (0.1 + 0.9) resulting in a Suppression Duration of 3 seconds.
o Example2: Power Burst has a damage scale of 2.12 resulting in a Suppression Duration of 6.39 seconds.
* Activating a foe Targeted Melee (Range >0' && Range => 7') damaging Power: 2s* Sum of damage scales.
o Example1: Swipe has a damage scale of 0.76 resulting in a suppression time of 1.52 seconds.
o Example2: Eviscerate has a damage scale of 1.99 resulting in a suppression time of 3.98 seconds.
* Activating a foe targeted Range debuff or control power: 3.5s
* Activating a foe targeted Melee debuff or control power: 2.5s
* Placing a Location Based Entity: 4s
* Activating a self or friend targeted Heal power: 4s
* Activating a Friend targeted Buff power: 4s
* Being the target of an attack: 2s
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Such an Awesum Ideaz <3 u castle
Make Fortitude Suppress eetz Oberpowereded
Buffz are the awesum
Next, lets take a look at the control powers changes.
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Control power changes are fairly extensive. The goal here was to make control effects less binary in nature. The shorter durations of status effects, combined with the change from status Protection to Status resistance means that these powers will now how impact on a PvP situation more frequently, but are no longer quite as severe a deciding factor.
* For Controllers: Change Duration base to 4 seconds for Stun, Sleep, Hold, Immobilize, Terrorize, Confuse, Untouchable, Intangible attributes. Duration of Status Effects (Hold, Sleep, etc.) no longer scale by level; instead they have fixed base durations.
* For Dominators: Change normal control Duration base to 4 seconds for Stun, Sleep, Hold, Immobilize, Terrorize, Confuse, Untouchable, Intangible attributes. Duration of Status Effects (Hold, Sleep, etc.) no longer scale by level; instead they have fixed base durations. Change Domination control Duration base to 4 seconds for Stun, Sleep, Hold, Immobilize, Terrorize, Confuse, Untouchable, Intangible attribs. Duration of Status Effects (Hold, Sleep, etc.) no longer scale by level; instead they have fixed base durations. Change Magnitude bonus from +3 to +1.
* For ALL OTHERS: Change control Duration base to 2 seconds for Stun, Sleep, Hold, Immobilize, Terrorize, Confuse, Untouchable, Intangible attributes. Duration of Status Effects (Hold, Sleep, etc.) no longer scale by level; instead they have fixed base durations.
* For Tankers: Change Taunt to a fixed 6 second duration.
* For Scrappers and Brutes: Change Taunt to a fixed 4 second duration.
* For the Manipulation Pool: Change Taunt to a fixed 4 second duration.
* For Stalkers: Change Placate to a fixed 10 second duration.
* For VEATs: Change Placate to a fixed 4 second duration.
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Changing Mez Prot 2 Mez Res Was The Bestest Change Evar
The other problem I see coming from this is essentially the normalization of all ATs. By drastically reducing the control ability of Dominators and Controllers, and by increasing the damage on their mezzes, youve basically turned them into DOMINATORS with less HP, ADDING one of the unique aspects of those ATs.
The change of focus from dynamic team roles to damage damage damage CREATES team balance and makes PvP more like a HEAVEN. Support can support, control can control, healers can heal about the only thing anyone is good for is a bit of rebuffing, BUFFING, CONTROLING and damage.
Next, heal decay.
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* A Heal Event now imposes a 25% Resistance to further heals on the character, regardless of source. This Resistance to heals will last for 15 seconds, and stacks with itself. This means that if you are healed 4 times, no further healing will affect you until the resistance duration ends.
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This is probably secondary to travel suppression in CREATING the ACTUAL ladder teams. I know the system was tweaked since this post (theres no longer 0% effectiveness) but
heal decay does belong in PvP in an MMO. Why was it added? This system ensures that the only heals that are really reliable when healing is most needed are BUILT UP AID OTHER AND STIMULANT. This system also ensures that
spiking is now a skillFUL damage spam until the target can STILL be healed, after which time the target must either phase, die, OR BE HEALED. As a healer on a PvP team, its my job to keep peoples HP bars in the green. I cant do that if my 400 HP heal is only healing them for 400 HP (yes, Im using real numbers here). Its at that point that I have to say Sorry, I tried. Quite frankly, that sucks. My buffs to enhance their survivability ARE FULLY EFFECTIVE, so they take LESS damage than they should, and then I CAN heal that damage away? That makes SO MUCH sense to me WE <3 CASTLE.
I would happily accept heal decay on self-heal powers (such as Healing Aura or Radiant Aura) if ally heal powers DID cause decay because that makes me feel AWESUM at a time when my teammates need me the most, and thats SO FUN. If you refuse that prospect, INCREASE the severity of heal decay in general heals are there to keep people alive when other methods have failed, and reducing their effectiveness is INCREASING the survivability of other players. Why not add heal decay to PvE as well? I mean, if PvP heal decay is any indication, >>>>being kept alive is not working as intended.<<<<
On to damage powers and damage calculation.
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* Powers now calculate damage based on their activation time, instead of their recharge.
* Lower activation time powers get a slight bonus to damage, due to chaining low damage powers being difficult in PvP.
* Longer Recharge time powers also get a slight damage bonus, so higher level powers with long recharge times deal extra damage.
* Damage has been adjusted for all AT's, reducing the damage gap between each AT.
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Let me start off by saying I agree with the idea of DPA balancing, but I dont agree with how it was implemented.
DPA balancing should have been implemented at the launch of the game, for the entire game, not just one part of the game nearly five years after launch. The reason adding this system to PvP now is a problem is simple: things just dont make sense. Lets take Flares and Blaze as our first examples. Flares recharges faster, uses less endurance, has a much longer range,
and can be used while mezzed, and does almost as much damage as Blaze, the supposed hard hitter of the Fire Blast set. Next, this means that some pool power attacks (Im looking at you, Flurry and Kick) which every AT has access to hit harder than some in-set attacks. How is this balanced? There are certain roles for certain ATs, melee damage should not be a generalist role. But, I forgot there are no roles now, thanks to all this normalization.
NERF AOE DAMAGE, I GOT 1 SHOT BY NUKES 2 ISSUES AGO, THEY ARE OP
Last but not least, base resistances.
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* Each AT now recieves a bonus resist buff while in PVP, in order to set each AT closer in overall survivability. This resist primarily reduces up the gap in hitpoints between lower hitpoint AT's and higher hitpoint AT's
* Epic armors and Tough (Pool Power) now provide resistance to all damage types while in PVP.
* Any armor set lacking a type of resist or defense will now provide it while in PvP zones.
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BLAH BLAH BLAH
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PS.....6 page post takes long time to edit
